Monat: November 2016

Calls

CfP: Call for abstracts for a special issue of “Climate Policy“ on “Policy instruments for limiting temperature rise to 1.5°C”

Deadline: 15. December 2016

„To date, research on greenhouse gas mitigation policy instruments has rarely been done in the context of very stringent mitigation targets. The Paris Agreement’s aim of limiting warming to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels, and pursuing efforts to limit the warming to 1.5°C, by achieving a balance between emissions and sinks in the second half of the century, and the special IPCC report due in 2018, creates an urgent need for research on climate policy instruments consistent with 1.5°C emissions pathways. With UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) including urgent action on climate change, the implications for development in many dimensions require attention. „

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Media

Resilience: Climate Change Policy and The Super-Hero Syndrome

„The United Nation’s main super-hero is called BECCS (Bio-Energy Carbon Capture [&] Storage). I know, not exactly as catchy as Superman, Thor, Cat Woman, or Wolverine, but what would you expect from a bunch of climate bureaucrats? BECCS is a true super-hero. The Bad Carbon will continue spewing itself into our atmosphere for decades to come, threatening to remove the ecological basis for modern human civilization. BECCS’s friends, Energy Efficiency and Clean Power, will have held back Bad Carbon a bit, but could not stop BC in time!“

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Peer-reviewed Publications

McGrail, B. Peter; et al. (2016): Field Validation of Supercritical CO 2 Reactivity with Basalts

McGrail, B. Peter; Schaef, Herbert T.; Spane, Frank A.; Cliff, John B.; Qafoku, Odeta; Horner, Jake A. et al. (2016): Field Validation of Supercritical CO2 Reactivity with Basalts. In Environ. Sci. Technol. Lett. DOI 10.1021/acs.estlett.6b00387

„Continued global use of fossil fuels places a premium on developing technology solutions to minimize increases in atmospheric CO2 levels. CO2 storage in reactive basalts might be one of these solutions by permanently converting injected gaseous CO2 into solid carbonates. Herein, we report results from a field demonstration in which ∼1000 metric tons of CO2 was injected into a natural basalt formation in eastern Washington state.“

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Media

Climate Law Blog: Climate Engineering Research Governance: A New Book Chapter by Mike Burger & Justin Gundlach

„The chapter describes the nascent and inchoate current state of climate engineering research governance, as well as the key issues that any effort to govern climate engineering must address. After surveying research efforts, issues, and institutions – or institutional gaps – the authors conclude as follows: “there is a very real and increasingly urgent need to answer the key questions surrounding governance: what qualifies as climate engineering research subject to governance, at what point do governance requirements kick in, what substantive rules should apply, and who should do the governing.”“

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Media

FECA Commentary: Can a Philosopher and a Scientist Co-teach a Class on Climate Engineering?

„The answer to this question is ‘yes’ because we did it, so perhaps it is more appropriate to ask whether such a class can betaught successfully. […] The idea of co-teaching a class on ethics and science focused on climate engineering originated with Steve Gardiner in mid-2013, leading to a class that we co-taught at the University of Washington during
Winter Quarter 2015. Our intent here is to summarize our experience and provide some lessons learned.“

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Media

Otago Daily Times: Betting on a brighter future

„Without that sort of ‘‘geoengineering’’, we’re sunk, or at least our coastlines are, Prof Flynn says. Given the inadequacy of the carbon-cutting commitments made last year in Paris, and now the climate disaster of a science-denying Republican president-elect in the US, efforts to decarbonise the world’s economies will not happen fast enough to prevent disastrous warming, he argues.„

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